JFK's grandson Jack Schlossberg shares emotional tribute to sister Tatiana after her death from cancer aged 35
Topics: John F. Kennedy, US News, Cancer
Phoebe Tonks
Featured Image Credit: ANGELA WEISS/AFP via Getty Images
Topics: John F. Kennedy, US News, Cancer
Jack Schlossberg, grandson of John F Kennedy and brother to the late environmental journalist Tatiana Schlossberg, has paid a heartfelt tribute to his sister following her death from cancer at 35.
Tatiana passed away on December 30 after being diagnosed with Acute Myeloid Leukemia, a form of aggressive blood cancer.
As the majority of the Kennedy family gathered to lay her to rest on Monday (January 5), her brother also took a moment to share a poignant tribute to his sister on Instagram.
In honour of his sister, Jack shared ten excerpts of poems and famous texts, along with a picture of himself with his sister when they were younger.
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He captioned the post with a single emoji of a cherry blossom flower, allowing the tribute to speak for itself.
In the first post on the carousel, Jack shared an excerpt of Tatiana’s own writing, taken from her 2019 book Inconspicuous Consumption.
“It's up to us to create a country that takes seriously its obligations to the planet, to each other, and to the people who will be born into a world that looks different than ours has for the past 10,000 years or so,” Tatiana wrote.
“Essentially, what I'm describing is hard work with possibly limited success for the rest of your life. But we have to do it, and at least we will have the satisfaction of knowing we made things better.
“Come on, it will be fun (?)” the excerpt concluded.
Among the other posts was an excerpt from Moby Dick about the immortality of whales, Crossing the Bar, a poem by Alfred Lord Tennyson, two excerpts of writings by Abraham Lincoln, along with poems by Rita S. Beer, Robert Frost, and Elizabeth Bishop.
Jack also shared a copy of Buddha’s last words: “Then the Buddha addressed all the monks once more, and these were the very last words he spoke.
“’Behold, O monks, this is my last advice to you. All component things in the world are changeable. They are not lasting. Work hard to gain your own salvation.’”
There was even a nod to Tatiana’s grandfather, JFK, and one of his most notable quotes: “There are three things in life which are real: God, human folly and laughter.
“Since the first two are beyond our comprehension, we must do what we can with the third.”
Tatiana first announced the news of her diagnosis in November 2025, when she penned a heartfelt essay for The New Yorker addressing the harrowing news and how she felt about it.
She revealed she had shown ‘no symptoms’ when she was given the diagnosis and had tried numerous different treatments to try and beat the disease, but ultimately had been given a terminal prognosis.
Heartbreakingly, Tatiana also addressed the so-called 'Kennedy curse' in her essay, saying that she did not want to add 'a new tragedy' to her mother Caroline's life.
“For my whole life, I have tried to be good, to be a good student and a good sister and a good daughter, and to protect my mother and never make her upset or angry,” Schlossberg wrote.
“Now I have added a new tragedy to her life, to our family's life, and there's nothing I can do to stop it.”
Caroline Kennedy is the daughter of the late John F Kennedy and his wife, Jackie.
She lost her father to an assassin's bullet when she was five years old and her mother to lymphoma in 1994. Her only sibling, JFK Jr, was killed in a plane crash in 1999.